finest performance of morning dew ever. jerry's 2 solos is the finest lead guitar by any guitarist ever. Clapton, Hendrix and the other so called "best ever" in their wildest dreams could not play with this skill. what are you people listening to? 8.5 minutes of perfection. get hearing aids people. 3 stars. WTF

i love 1970

Yup, from about 10:52-12:05 or so there's a very clear Darlin' Corey (or Darkness Darkness) jam, you pick. Deadlists says Darkness, but check out the 11-20-70 show with Jorma etc for the 'only' known version performed (really sung IMHO). Either way it's a gem tucked neatly inside a fantastic, late post-Alligator.

But this will have to do:
This was and is and was and is a great show.

excellent music from an era of high energy, the jam out of alligator hints some abb themes, cool stuff.

email me at fieldhouse11277@hotmail.com happy to share with some good listeners

I have listened to few Dancin's as fine as this one. Excellent jamming, and I like the slow groove. The rest of the show is solid, but nothing special.

Great Tighten Up jam in the middle of Dancin'

maybe.

There is so much goodness in this and I can see bear's points below however from a musical standpoint regardless of the provenance of this it is some ubelievable jamming especially the jam out drums II... Good lovin, Alligator, China>Rider all sent chills... This is as good as it gets on this site.

After much thought and two listens = 5 stars.

just listened to this show and let me tell u it is in my opinion in the top five of the summer shows (70) a nice fillmore west show which i believe starting after this the better shows were performed at the fillmore east until the demise of the venue in april (killer run 4/25-29 71 commercially released as ladies and gentlemen... but recommed both Ladies and also the shows for completeness) shortly after the west would share the same fate in july the dead grew up and moved into the arena era (winterland) here and there they would humble themselves and play at the modest theaters but this is definitely a classic fillmore west run 6/4-7 i can not wait until i can listen to the 7th. its a shame no more downloads but on with the review of the show
acoustic set missing (oh well) i have read and heard it was average at best, but it would have been nice for completeness. now i can honestly say i have heard better versions of every single song on here from every different dead era they were performed at but thats not why this is getting a five out of five the five comes from first the segues dire>alligator flawless not big on "drums" but if ur a drum lover there is a decent drum session and more than one i might add i believe two or three great morning dew opener above par for this eras but the magic is def on the second disk the love>nfa>love is unique in its own right and flawess in transistions and lyrical communications in the song ie pigpens rap into the harmony of "im gonna tell u.." ive heard pig doin better ones but nothing quite as unique as this one please ive only listened to not even a quater of the shows out there so i am not going to pretend i am a true critic and am a dead know it all snob so if this electric set is not unique disregard everything i just said haha please tell me whats up and where i should be looking but in my opinion this show a classic and fun for the matter is def worth ur time and a pure gem of one of the last great fillmore west outing in my opinion of course so to recap also!!!!!!!! forgot the awbygn jam into a darkness jam ahhhhhhh this to my knowledge is one of the last awbygn jams soon after it was thrown at the end of gdtrfb right before the transition into nfa and i believe def sat better by itself as a stand alone jam (awbygn my fav jam biased but check that one out i dont believe they label them on here but on www.deadlists.com they r there is about a 14 minute jam on my tape between drums>love not that unique until about 8 mins in to it but they r def there awbygn jam starts about 8:30 on my tape and the darkness maybe around 11:00 just guessin im not listening to it right now. but the finals...
song selection uniques-5
performance-4
vibe/energy(not real upbeat hence the attics but i am referring to the energy of the show) 4
histortic uniques-5 one of the last great runs in my opinion of the west
sound-solid sdb of the era-4
sorry for eating up so much space just trying to give this show the credit it deserves in my opinion

A fun show; not among the truly elite gigs of the year (imho) but hardly in the "play once or twice and put away for good" category either.

As for Bear's comments, he must be fried. There are plenty of tapes, both from audience and soundboard sources, floating around from that period. While a few are undoubtedly mislabeled or composites assembled from other shows, obviously many are not. Like any eyewitness to any event, his memory is subject to become more faulty with each passing year; the fact that "he was there" doesn't hold much weight 30-plus years later. Just 'cause Bear says it's so doesn't make it so.

This is worth getting if, for no other reason, that there are so few good SBD's from the summer of 1970. Just to give some historical perspective - this was only one month after the Kent State OH student deaths (murders) which lent a large measure of uncertainty, paranoia and intensity to a year that was already a major turning point for the peace movement, the counterculture and also the rock music world. Should we retreat to the country, buy guns, or continue trying to change things?
The Grateful Dead, born from the same Haight Ashbury mother that created much of the counterculture - both politically and artistically - could not help but be influenced by all that was happening around them. As is evident from their comments to the crowd at Harper College, 5/2/70 (Dick's Picks #8). The legends are true - go buy it!!
So these shows are a pleasant rarity from a very important year in Dead history, as they began to change their sound from the cosmic distortion of a 1969 Dark Star to the acoustic flavor of FOTD and Cumberland.
I don't know what to make of Owsley's comments below. I have dozens of 68 - 70 shows where Bobby or the band is talking to Bear from the stage about monitors. And if Bear didn't let these shows out, then who did? C'mon. Many of these shows in question have been long in circulation, long discussed on internet forums, verified in Deadbase, and have even been leaked or traded or commented on by people close to the Dead (I'm not naming names but you know).
So if all these show dates/lists are bogus - as Bear claims, then someone would have surely caught it by now, as anal as all us collectors are, LOL. I suspect Bear is either pulling our collective legs, or he's dipped too deeply into his Kool Aid!
Now - to this show. I must say that, after the great 1969 run at the Fillmore West in Feb-Mar, I see these shows from the Fillmore in 1970 and think, "wow, these gotta be just as good". Wrong. Maybe they were still tired from their England trip (5/24) only 2 weeks ago. But trying to compare 1970 in general to 1969 is like oranges and apples. And not fair really. 1969 was the apothesis of the "old Dead" and 1970 was, at times, a shaky rebirth of a new kind of Dead.
If I were doing a box set of these 3 shows, I would include much of 6/5, esp. the Other One which is quite good despite the nasty cut at the end. And also the acoustic set from 6/7, which is also good. But this show overall is my favorite. A nice Morning Dew starts the electric set, and the Dancin is slow but well done. Then Jerry gets things warmed up with a great early China>Rider where the long jam transition harkens forward to 1972 - 1974 versions.
New Orleans (the 1st) works well and is a nice surprise. One wonders why they didn't develop it further. Jerry and the drums really kick it. Then a super rare Attics, wow! Not album perfect, but you'll be hard pressed to find a better one in 1970 where the vocals are this stunningly good.
Then on Disc Two things really get down to business, as they enter the old familiar 1968 territory of Alligator and Lovelight. After the Drums, Garcia takes the helm with a long firey 14 minute jam. The drummers lock into synch and play with precision and thunder. This is a monster jam, almost Dark Star territory. Then Pigpen takes over and delivers another great sermon on how to get laid, Dr. Ruth in a cowboy hat! The NFA> Lovelight seque is strong, but unfortunately cut at the end. But the fine UJB closer makes up for it.
For some reason, the Dead seemed to play their most inspired 1970 shows at the Fillmore EAST, not West. But this show is still worth having. A lot of fun and a bookmark in the Dead's 1970 summer of transition. The addition of the missing acoustic set would make this an even better, well rounded classic.
enjoy,
Dr. Flashback :-)

This is the only Fillmore West mid-1970 Alligator listed on the archive.
I went to 6 Fillmore West Dead shows in 1970, and at one of them they started "Alligator" with kazoos.
Garcia played a solo very similar to the one that begins the jam on Feb. 14, 1968 (Anthem of the Sun).
I remember Garcia turning up the volume and the sustain resulting from his slight touch on the bottom E string (again, similar to what you hear on Anthem of the Sun).

Could Alligator have been played at the August 17, 1970 FW show - for which the set list is incomplete and only Casey Jones was recorded?

I do remember Garcia opening a set with a chilling version of "Morning Dew", likely this is it.

I emailed Owsley, Bear to find out more about circulating tapes missing moments from the Fillmore West 1970 shows.

Owsley replied:

"No the truth is, all the tapes you refer to are bogus-
fakes, as are 90% of all 'rare' shows and virtually all early shows supposed to be 'soundboards'.
The thing is, the Dead played thousands of shows, and
mostly in halls which sounded a lot alike. They had a
wide but repetitive repertoire, and it is child's play to
assemble virtually any kind of 'set list' from any taper's extensive and varied collection of tapes.

If you, personally, did not actually, on your own
machine- record a given show, there is literally no way it can ever be proven to you to be from any particualar show. Thus all that huge taper
scene is generally of interest only so far as the tape is
listenable, and had zero historic significance- that falls only to the archival tapes recorded by the band's successive soundmen and kept in the GD vault.

Trust me, I NEVER have given any copies of my sonic
journals to anyone and no one else recorded the shows, from my board OR in the audience- we did in fact from time to time confiscate tapes and machines. Cassette recorders, especially stereo ones, were very
rare, reel to reel machines bulky, and also expensive-
live taping in the audience simply did not happen back then, however there are tapes
floating around which even claim to be of shows which
were cancelled and never happened..."

Quote -unquote...

This was a great show imo, no matter what few seconds are missing. June 7th may have an edge over this one so check that one out as well.
If I had to choose from experience rather than sound quality or availability of circulating tapes, the June (and August) '70 are the best Grateful Dead shows of the ones I attended.
June 4th and August 17th are available, with various songs and banter missing.
Oh well, maybe you had to be there to want to hear bits again, such as the Bob Weir banter, "Stand on your heads" in response to the inter-audience catcalls to sit down/ stand up.
P.S.
In answer to Chris U's question below,
he may have issues about compensation for his historic recordings, or it could be he'd like to have the last word on the dates and locations of shows that he taped. He also mentioned not being sent comps of recent CDs that he contributed to.
"Alice D. Millionaire" maybe, maybe not.

If Bear did say this

"no one else recorded the shows, from my board OR in the audience-"

then he must be dreaming. Surrepticious unauthorized audience tapes were made of the Dead and other bands of the period. We've all heard them. Why would Bear pretend otherwise?

good stuff here good sound worth my time yours too

This is one of the handful of shows featuring the Darkness, Darkness jam (it happens after Alligator). It's haunting.

This was one of the first shows from 1970 I got my hands on, and has been a favourite for a long time. The Dancing in the Street is one of my favorites (I love the tom tom fills during the jam), and the New Orleans just pops out of the drums in Good Lovin'. The sound isn't fantastic, but still sounds sharp for a 34 year old recording. There are a few cuts here and there, but over all, well worth a listen. Also, its Pigpen heavy!!